


Fights and Hospitals

by bewildered_soop



Series: phoenix writes things [4]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Abusive Dave's Bro | Beta Dirk Strider, Angst, Canonical Child Abuse, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Crushes, Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hospitalization, Hospitals, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Near Death Experiences, POV Third Person, Pre-Slash, Self-Esteem Issues, amputation but for an eye???, dave strider looses an eye what is it called, guys look i finally wrote something with comfort, it's really pre-slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-14 18:42:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29796213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewildered_soop/pseuds/bewildered_soop
Summary: dave gets abused and then karkat calls an ambulance and then fluffsorry if they're ooc!
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas
Series: phoenix writes things [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2182689
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	Fights and Hospitals

**Author's Note:**

> yes i am also a homestuck hi :) davekat is a major comfort ship of mine as i kin both characters (both for fun and coping) also please don't start discourse in the comments!
> 
> TWs in tags

It was a normal day. Just a normal day, nothing out of the ordinary, a completely normal day in a completely normal life. That was what Dave told himself for so long. For a while, he even managed to convince himself of it. He tricked his six-year-old brain into thinking that not knowing when his next meal was coming was normal. Everyone strifed with their guardian, right? Perfectly normal to have cameras watching you as well as deadly weapons and sex puppets strewn all over the house right? Looking back on it he probably should’ve known long ago that it wasn’t, but Bro homeschooled him and didn’t let him have any social interactions. After some point Bro let him have online friends with the warnings of “Don’t tell them anything, or there will be consequences.” and “I will be watching your conversations.” He realized after a few months that his home life wasn’t normal, but tried to convince himself that it was just better, that this life was super ironic, that he’d turn 18 and Bro would reveal that it was all a test for the real world or something. Deep down he knew that that wouldn’t happen, that Bro was abusive, but he forced those thoughts into a corner where he could ignore them.

Dave liked to keep track of the patterns so he could tell if it’d be a good day or not. One thing that he noticed was that the ‘training’ strifes got so much worse and just turned into ‘beat up Dave’ sessions before Bro went away. It was worse depending on how long he’d be gone, and today was a very bad day. Bro had mentioned that he’d be leaving early tomorrow for ‘a few weeks’ which meant that Dave was going to be hurt badly. To top all of this off, Bro had recently been dumped, so he was pissed. Sure enough, after a while of hiding in his room, the dreaded note appeared. “Bro, roof, now. Bring lil’ cal. We’re doin it man, we’re makin this happen.” The same note every time, he didn’t even bother trying to write a new one. It still had a little rip that he had made to check that. Dave grabbed the least shitty katana he owned, Lil’ Cal, and went to the roof. When he got up there Bro wasn’t there. Or at least he didn’t seem to be. Dave knew better, he knew that Bro was there, sitting in the shadows, waiting for the perfect time to strike. Dave set Lil’ Cal down on the AC unit and got into stance.

He waited a few seconds, although it felt like minutes to him, before Bro did anything. Bro moved so quickly you couldn’t even see him, and landed the first hit, stabbing Dave in the arm. Right then and there Dave knew that this was going to be a really bad day for him. The next few minutes were a blur for Dave just being hit, after hit, after hit, after hit and the occasional sound of him block. Not once did he manage to land a hit on Bro. At some point Dave’s sunglasses were knocked off, the change in brightness was enough to shock his photosensitive eyes and leave him blind for a moment. In that moment of temporary blindness, Bro stabbed him in the stomach. When Bro removed the katana from Dave’s stomach, Dave collapsed. Bro just looked at him with utter disappointment, clicked his tongue and said, “You’d think after years of this training you’d actually retain some information. Maybe if you did you wouldn’t keep getting hit.” There was a moment of silence, before Dave spoke.  
“Fuck you.” Those two words immediately turned Bro’s face into a look of anger and then just calm, but the kind that made you know that shit was about to go down.  
“What was that?” Bro asked, voice dripping with cold anger, while still maintaining a calm demeanor.  
“I said, fuck you.” Was Dave's weak reply. “You try and put the blame on me but we both know that you’re just an abusive asshole who takes pleasure in torturing a child. Who are you trying to fool?”

At that moment any shred of calmness left Bro’s body, he took back out his katana and ran it straight through one of Dave’s eyes, insulting him, and then leaving with the katana still stuck through Dave’s eye. Dave sits there for a moment before pulling out his phone to pester one of his friends. It’s extremely hard to type considering his arms had been beat up pretty badly, but he manages. He checks who’s online and sees that, for some reason, Karkat is.  
\--turntechGodhead [TG] started pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] at 02:35--  
TG: uh  
TG: hey man  
TG: fuck  
CG: MY GOG DAVE WHAT IN THE EVERLOVING FUCK DO YOU WANT AT THIS HOUR.  
TG: uh  
TG: well  
CG: JUST FUCKING SPIT IT OUT. I CAN’T DEAL WITH YOUR FUCKING RANTS THIS LATE SO GET TO THE POINT QUICKLY.  
TG: uh, so  
TG: funny story really  
TG: but  
TG: i might be dying  
CG: ...  
CG: DAVE WHAT THE FUCK.  
CG: DAVE PLEASE TELL ME YOUR FUCKING JOKING.  
TG: uh,  
TG: no?  
CG: WHAT. HOW. WHEN. I’M SO CONFUSED.  
TG: long story short  
TG: i finally realized my bros an abusive piece of shit and after he beat me up again i told him to fuck off  
TG: yeah, uh, he didnt like that  
TG: so now im probably dying and have a katana stuck through one of my eyes  
TG: its a bit hard to see things  
CG: FUCK.  
CG: THAT’S REALLY BAD.  
CG: DAVE WHERE ARE YOU?  
CG: LIKE, YOUR ADDRESS.  
TG: wow karkles  
TG: thats a bit stalkerish huh  
CG: OH MY GOG DAVE SHUT UP.  
CG: I’M TRYING TO HELP YOUR STUPID ASS SO MAYBE YOU CAN JUST FUCKING TELL ME YOUR ADDRESS.  
TG: ok man, geeze  
TG: its apartment 4 on the 13th floor. the complex is 1995 on gun street in the good old town of houston texas  
CG: NORMALLY I’D QUESTION WHY YOU LIVE ON A STREET NAMED *GUN* BUT THERE’S MORE PRESSING MATTERS SO I’M CALLING AN AMBULANCE, OK?  
CG: ACTUALLY I DON’T KNOW WHY I ASKED IF IT WAS OK.  
CG: I’M DOING IT EITHER WAY.  
TG: ok dude  
CG: OK I’VE CALLED THEM, THEY SAID THEY’RE ON THEIR WAY.  
TG: cool  
TG: ill just wait here  
TG: uh bye i guess

\--turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] at 02:42--

Dave put down his phone and stared up at the full moon and the stars. He smiled to himself, remembering the times in which he had come up here late at night just to look at the sky. He closed his eyes for a brief moment, suddenly feeling the pure exhaustion from the strife catch up to him. He considered falling asleep for a moment, but then he reminded himself that he was very vulnerable if he fell asleep now. He forced his eyes back open and, as a way to both keep him awake and calm his anxious nerves, traced the constellations he knew. He had been interested in astronomy for a while, but Bro had discouraged it, saying it wasn’t ironic enough. Dave had continued to like the stars and space, just more privately.

As he was tracing the patterns in his mind he was vaguely aware of the sound of sirens coming closer. He paused for a moment, remembering a memory from when he was 10. It was the hottest day in the year and he and Bro had strifed only a bit earlier. Of course, he had been horribly beaten, and now he was laying on the roof staring at the sky through his shades. He had laid like that for maybe 30 minutes before he had forced himself to get up and go back to his room. He remembered having started walking down the stairs, and then he had tripped over a smuppet that Bro had, without doubt, left there just to trip him. His 10-year-old self registered all too late that he was falling and couldn’t stop. He had fallen down multiple flights of stairs, and remembered laying at the bottom of them, coated in blood, partially from the strife and partially from the fall. His hearing had started to fade out when he heard the sirens and had figured that someone had called the ambulance. He remembered that after he got back from the hospital Bro had beaten him extra hard.

He blinked his eyes and the vision of 10-year-old him covered in blood laying at the base of the steps faded away. He bitterly smiled to himself, that memory had been the inspiration of the iconic line, “I warned you about stairs bro”. His mind wandered off to old memories, some happy, some sad. He recognized that there were people coming up the stairs to the roof, and that they were lifting him off the ground and onto a stretcher but everything was just so fuzzy at that point and it had felt like he wasn’t even there. He fully blacked-out after they got him in the ambulance and on the way to the hospital.

After he finally woke up, he stared at the white ceiling for a moment, not remembering where he was or why he was there. He noticed that half of his vision was blacked out though. After a few moments passed before he came to the realization that he’s in a hospital. He pushed his brain for a few more minutes before remembering that he had finally told Bro to “fuck off”. The whole ‘only seeing from one eye’ made more sense to him, he figured that his other eye was just covered. Dave chuckled to himself before wincing as the dehydration kicked in, which made his throat hurt like a bitch. He mentally sighed, and pushed himself into a sitting position to better look around the room. When he did so he noticed that someone’s in the room. They had brown eyes, brown hair, a light brown skin tone, and were wearing an oversized sweater and some jeans. Dave couldn’t tell how tall they were due the fact that they were sitting but they appeared to be quite short.

They were staring at a wall, seemingly lost in thought. Dave attempted to clear his throat and asked in a cracked voice, “Do you have any water?” They snapped back into reality and stared at Dave before softly responding with a noise of confusion. “I asked if you had any-“ Dave was cut off by his own hacking as his throat protested its abuse.  
“Water, right? I’ll go call the nurse for some, you just focus on breathing okay?” Dave nodded in response. They pressed the button to call the nurse and spoke to the nurse when he got there. After a few moments a cup of water was passed to Dave and he slowly drank it all.

After finishing it he cleared his throat again and asked, “I don’t mean to be rude, but who the fuck are you?” The person stared for a moment, then gave an amused smile before responding,  
“Take a wild fucking guess.” Dave thought for a moment, trying to remember who this person could be, suddenly, it clicked,  
“Karkat?”  
“In the flesh” Karkat chuckled.  
“Wait, don’t you live in Seattle? This is Texas, how did you get here?”  
“I took a plane, dumbass.”  
“You took a plane, to Texas, from Seattle, to see me in the hospital?”  
“Yes, you’re really fucking slow aren’t you.”  
“No, I’m just confused as to why.”  
“My god, you’re a fucking moron. So one of the fuckfaces I can actually tolerate most of the time is dying and I’m supposed to just stay in Seattle? Fuck no.”  
“Awwwww, Karkles cares about me!” Dave smiled at Karkat.  
“I- shut up.” Karkat blushed and looked away from Dave.

They sat there in a comfortable silence for a while til the doctor came in. The doctor nodded towards Karkat before turning to face Dave. “Do you want the good news first or the bad news?” Dave thought for a moment before responding,  
“Give me the bad news first.” The doctor hesitated before saying,  
“Very well, the bad news is that the injuries you had when you got here were pretty severe. Most of it has just scarred over but we couldn’t save your eye. We had to remove it so that it couldn’t damage anything. So now you only have one eye.”  
“Oh.” That was all Dave said. He guessed that it made sense, who would be able to recover from a katana shoved through their eye? Just thinking back to how easily the blade cut through his eyeball made him shudder.

“What about the good news?” Karkat said nervously, he scooted closer to Dave in an attempt to comfort him, Karkat wasn’t sure how effective it was but Dave seemed to relax a bit more so he took that as a good thing.  
“The good news is that you’ve healed fairly quickly so you can get discharged in a few days after some test results come back.” Dave nodded in response, but didn’t say anything, still thinking over what he was just told. While he was processing the doctor left, not before telling them that if they had any further questions to call for a nurse and ask them. Dave was just staring blankly at the wall, eyes unfocused as he processed what was just said.

“Hey,” Karkat said, “You okay?” Karkat waited for Dave to respond, but when he didn’t, Karkat tried again. “Dave!” Karkat lightly shook Dave, “Dave, you there?” This seemingly snapped Dave back to the present, and he responded with a sound of confusion. Karkat sighed before repeating what he asked.  
“Oh, uh, yeah. I’m just a bit shocked that like, you’re here and Bro isn’t. Yah know?” Dave nervously laughed. “Like I still just don’t understand why you flew all the way out here just to see me because i was injured and-“  
“Dave,” Karkat cut him off, resting his hand on Dave’s shoulder, “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I flew out here because you were dying and I care about you. Despite how rude I am to you I’ve never wanted to see you get hurt. So of _course_ I’d fly out to be with you while you’re hospitalized.”

There was silence for a few more moments, before Dave sniffed. Karkat began slightly panicking, “Oh shit, uh, did I make you upset? Fuck I’m not good with words, I’m sorry?” Dave let out a wet laugh before responding,  
“No, dumbass. You didn’t make me upset, I just wasn’t expecting that kind of response.” Karkat sighed in relief,  
“Thank fuck, I was scared that I had done something to make you cry.” They fell into a comfortable silence, just taking comfort in the fact that the other was there. After a while of this, there was a weight suddenly on Karkat’s shoulder. Karkat made a soft noise of confusion before looking down.

His face relaxed into a sweet smile when he saw that Dave had just fallen asleep on his shoulder. He shifted himself in the bed to make it more comfortable for Dave, and ended up basically laying next to him. Dave shifted in his sleep, hugging Karkat and snuggling closer to him. Karkat’s face flushed bright red at this action. Eventually, his face returned to its normal colour. The circumstances that got him here might’ve been sad but he couldn’t help but find utter peace in the moment. Karkat slowly hugged Dave back, and, after a while, fell asleep as well.

**Author's Note:**

> if y'all want a part 2 let me know :) it'd probably be karkat and dave actually confessing and stuff!


End file.
